The present invention relates to a method for monitoring tires. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method for use in a tire monitoring system in which measurements are taken on the tires with the view of providing the fullest possible assistance to the driver of a vehicle having such a system.
The primary aim of tire monitoring systems is to alert the driver of any anomaly which could occur to the tires, or to one of these tires. For that, it is impossible to be satisfied with displaying the pressure values, and the temperature if necessary, measured in the tires. Permanent consultation of these indications risks being tiresome, and especially their interpretation by the driver remains very problematic because these measurements are influenced by various disturbances such as heat build-up in the tire during operation. This is why a processor takes charge of global use of signals, according to a suitable processing program to give an alert to the driver when one of his tires, or several among them, are no longer in a normal state of operation, or even entering into a dangerous area for the safety of using the vehicle.
The aim of the present invention is to be able not only to ensure the "alert" function in case of failure, but also to be able to provide assistance when the tires are reinflated one after the other during a periodic maintenance operation, in an inflation station or even using a portable air pump. In this case, quite often, the operator does not have a chart available giving the inflation pressures of the vehicle concerned. Even if he has a tire pressure monitoring system available, it does not necessarily inform the operator of the nominal pressure values. It is burdensome to require the operator to proceed with successive adjustments by consulting the indications provided on the dashboard by the tire monitoring system between each adjustment.
It has been proposed to use a tire monitoring system to provide the operator with assistance with reinflation. For example, the driver may be asked to indicate to the system, through an appropriate command on the dashboard for example, that one is going to proceed with reinflation. Alternatively, a sensor, on, for example, the valve, may allow for detecting the use of an air pump, as proposed in the patent application EP 0 284 895. However, the need still exists for a method of automatically determining that a tire of a vehicle is undergoing reinflation so that, through appropriate configuration of a tire monitoring system, the vehicle driver is automatically alerted that the tire is undergoing reinflation.